Poetry
Much of my poetry is minimally edited. I believe that the feelings and emotions of the writer at the moment of creation are the piece, and any changes made must be solely focused on bringing it to the surface.
Some of my pieces have been published in Riverrun, Saint Mary’s College of California’s undergraduate literature magazine.
Summer in the Underworld
The babbling Styx grows quiet
As seedlings flee up through the thaw.
The gardens of Elysium wilt and turn
Without a seasoned nurturing palm,
And the Underworld prepares for frost once more.
The discordant whispers on the air
Scream of a life past by;
now may never to blossom again
For the Lord of Asphodel.
If Tartarus would one day know again the warmth of joy,
The fates only know.
For Hades,
In his merigold sepulcher,
Summer has no end.
Babylonia
In the hollowed chambers of the royal court
We three hung the silence on our lips.
The prince sat on the steps,
Empty throne above him framed by the star painted glass.
His crown lay below, askew against marble,
his ringed fingers limply holding returned parchment.
A simple correspondence, a meager offer returned,
A jewelry box and position rejected has shattered
The piety of man.
The first of his name, nine soon to follow.
The whore stood poised,
Burgundy clad
Empty arms crossed before her
Covered marked wrists
And now empty palms.
Her back to the throne
Cast a shadow over her face,
So only I could see hopeful finality in her eyes.
While her breath did shake the still we shared
Her stance did not waver
Required no salvation.
Seven could not have her.
One lord was no different.
I, seeing their eyes level with mine,
Held the room in anticipation.
Tree Bath
For my sister
I'm walking beside footsteps
of a different form of me.
We say that I got the half that
was left after her.
Like the sun and moon
we shared the sky for a time
after her time alone had passed,
and mine was yet to come.
Now I walk across
a bridge inside the
forest of her time
that I now occupy
myself.
She says the Japanese
call it “tree bathing”
and that is why
she missed this place.
However this forest is not mine.
I'm walking through a memory
fragment behind another me,
watching as she relives
the moments that I
stumble through now.
She walks through the shades,
amid the bathing trees,
passing in and out of now,
returning to and from ten years past.
She has another her
tied to her chest, who is
perhaps passing through now and later,
perhaps beside the footsteps
of another form of her.
As my feet fall onto
the soft wood below me,
time begins to slow.
A bridge of ten years
becomes little more than
oaken slabs from the trees it joins,
carrying passengers
through the wash of pacific green.
Tír na nÓg
There will remain quiet rains.
The hush of the Corrib does not stop
At the end of a year.
Birds will sleep, but not die
The trees will fall bare, but still grow
The sun will shine low, but still rise.
When winter begins, and I wake from this dream,
What will my memories have to say?
When my feet touch ground,
Will the island of my dreams still remain?
Will I be able to return as a young man,
Or will I still look east when my hair turns to grey?
This is not the sky that I know,
but it is the one that has shown me the most.
This is not the sea that had born me,
It is the one that has called me its own.
This is not the land that had raised me,
It is the one where, right now, I am home.